Posts Tagged "sony icd"

I’ve been really all over the place with my song selections lately, but this week I settled on the new song “Your Decision” by [wiki]Alice In Chains[/wiki]. It just seems to fit well with my style, and I thought it would do well.

I had planned for the first time in a podcast to record multiple track/layers, and do some video effects, but I ran out of time. Additionally, I forgot to bring my voice recorder (Sony ICD-SX700 that I always use for podcasts) home, so I ended up having to use Audition on my recording machine anyway.

Given that, I decided to go ahead and tweak the audio (EQ, reverb, compressor) and add a lead. Somehow, whatever I did makes the entire video seem dubbed (the guitar solo and one little vocal part are, of course, dubbed, but the rest is not!!) And yes, I had to extend the lead a little, because I left too many measures with the rhythm. lol I typically like leads anyway, so it gave me a chance to use the old lead and add a little of my own flair.

Anyway, I originally (after recording) wouldn’t have said it is my best performance ever, but the quality overall seemed better the more I listen. The tweaks on the vocals definitely highlight my voice way more than typical. This new recording style may be here to stay, given that it’s really no more difficult than the voice recorder, and it lets me add additional layers. This in turn gives me more time to play around with studio equipment and try out and perfect techniques for future albums. Let me know what you think!

One of my new favorite songs is “Odd One” by Sick Puppies, and I had to do it as a podcast. I really didn’t get the time to rehearse it like I wanted to, but it turned out pretty well despite that!

This makes the third week now using my Ibanez MMM-1 baritone guitar (which I love!), and the second week doing video but using the Sony ICD-SX700 to record the audio. The new format is here to stay (merging of the old style with actual video of me playing) if I can get the video mixing process down to where it doesn’t take me hours … (Using Cinelerra, and am still learning the nuances).

Not long after I first heard this song (by Alter Bridge) I decided I wanted to do it as a podcast. Biggest problem? It’s very rangy, so it was hard for me to sing. Luckily I got new strings for my baritone guitar, so I was able to get it low enough to be just perfect.

This week you’ll notice that I finally got the hybrid down for the video — I have the intro screen, but I also videoed myself. The recording was done separately (once again on my Sony ICD-SX700 voice recorder) and I linked them later. The problem was it was quite difficult to the the audio and video to sync in rendering … but it’s fairly close (the program I used was Cinelerra).

Anyway, here it is. It’s about as good as I have ever performed this song. Enjoy!

This week’s podcast is another two-parter. The first song is “Lightning Crashes,” a great song by [wiki]Live[/wiki] who I first heard live when I was in college in 1997 or 1998. I sing the song with Town Crier. This recording was made before I really “moved in” to the song, so there are some variations that I no longer do.

The second song is “The Thirst” from my album The Threshold of Omniscience. I originally chose the song as a podcast right after I wrote it. I liked it so much, I just had to share. It too, has evolved somewhat.

As usual, these songs were recorded by just me and my acoustic guitar in my studio on my Sony ICD-SX700 Voice Recorder.

This week’s songs are “[wiki]Mr. Jones[/wiki]” (originally by the [wiki]Counting Crows[/wiki]), and “Bedroom of the Sun” by Me (on my album Triad).

The reason there are two songs this week is I decided to start doing one cover and one original each week. I chose to do “Mr. Jones” because I sing it with Town Crier (it’s the last song in our first set), and “Bedroom Of The Sun” is just one of my favorites (it was also requested).

As usual, this is just me on my acoustic guitar, recorded at home in my studio on my Sony ICD-SX700 voice recorder.

This week’s song is a great one by Steve Earle — inspired at least partially by [wiki]The Killer Angels[/wiki] by [wiki]Michael Shaara[/wiki]. It’s a great song sung by Irish immigrant [wiki]Buster Kilrain[/wiki] during the Civil War.

Recorded as just me and my acoustic in my studio on my Sony ICD-SX700 voice recorder.

This week’s song is “Country Roads,” originally performed by John Denver (of course). I did a demonstration about music recording to some students at my old school in Sept. 09, and I thought it would be a good choice for a podcast.

As usual, this recording is a simple live version done on a Sony ICD-SX700 Voice Recorder.

As many of you know, I’ve recently started to build a bigger fan base (well, a noticeable fan base) through Facebook. In that effort, I’ve decided to start uploading my podcasts to YouTube to make them easier to share. So, I’ve decided to “rerun” the previous podcasts and rename (quite strikingly) the series as “Weekly Acoustic Podcast.” (I know, catch your breath!)

Anyway, the process of rerunning should take 2-3 months, and after that I’ll begin uploading new material.

This week’s song is “I’ll Be,” originally performed by Edwin McCain in the 90s. It is one that I sing with my band Town Crier.

My podcasts are recorded as just me on my acoustic guitar in my studio on my Sony ICD-SX700 voice recorder. Enjoy!

For those who don’t know the back story, my friend Phil Taylor and I, having been somewhat lacking in the new material, challenged one another to write and record a new album before and to be released on January 1, 2010. This was in approximately November (2009 of course).

Knowing my own lack of spare time, I knew I would not be able to do full studio productions, but I felt confident I could write the songs. After all, I had made a 2009 resolution to write new material, and I needed some catalyst (kick-in-the-butt).

I had originally intended to do 13 songs, but I ran shorter on time than even I anticipated, so I settled on 10. I would release the album as my podcast on January 1 (how convenient that it fell on a Friday). I figured that would would be perfect, because in my business I had missed 2 weeks of podcasts already. Unfortunately, even at that, due to the New Year’s gig I did with Town Crier, I lost my voice, so I even missed the January 1 podcast.

At any rate, I finally got the songs recorded (once again on my trusty Sony ICD-SX700), and here they are.

Unlike usual, I did do minimal editing, but only to do some equalization correction. The recordings were not perfect anyway (they include the occasional flub and some cameos of my son screaming), but I wanted them to be as “tolerable” as possible.

My goal is to do full productions of this album by March of this year (2010), but I admit this is highly ambitious. 🙂